Why do we yawn? The importance of evidence for specific yawn-induced effects

Guggisberg, Adrian G; Mathis, Johannes; Schnider, Armin; Hess, Christian W (2011). Why do we yawn? The importance of evidence for specific yawn-induced effects. Neuroscience & biobehavioral reviews, 35(5), pp. 1302-4. Oxford: Elsevier 10.1016/j.neubiorev.2010.12.004

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Gallup (this issue) believes that our recent review on the function of yawning (Guggisberg et al., 2010) is unbalanced and that it ignores evidence for his thermoregulation hypothesis. Here we address these criticisms and show them to be untenable. While we never claimed that the social hypothesis of yawning has "definite experimental support", we emphasize the importance of experimental evidence for specific effects of yawns when considering why we yawn. The only specific effect of yawning that could be demonstrated so far is its contagiousness in humans, some non-human primates, and possibly dogs, whereas all studies investigating physiological consequences of yawns were unable to observe specific yawn-induced effects in the individual of any species. The argument that from an evolutionary perspective, yawns must have a "primitive" physiological function arises from imprecise reasoning.

Item Type:	Journal Article (Original Article)
Division/Institute:	04 Faculty of Medicine > Department of Head Organs and Neurology (DKNS) > Clinic of Neurology
UniBE Contributor:	Guggisberg, Adrian (B), Mathis, Johannes, Hess, Christian Walter
ISSN:	0149-7634
Publisher:	Elsevier
Language:	English
Submitter:	Factscience Import
Date Deposited:	04 Oct 2013 14:14
Last Modified:	29 Mar 2023 23:32
Publisher DOI:	10.1016/j.neubiorev.2010.12.004
PubMed ID:	21168437
Web of Science ID:	000289337500018
URI:	https://boris.unibe.ch/id/eprint/3359 (FactScience: 207025)